The "Buzz" Coin Blog with Dave Harper

Deliveries speed up
Posted by Dave

Collectors are generally fair when it comes to evaluating the performance of the U.S. Mint, though newcomers to the hobby might wonder about it after being exposed to collector comments about the Mint in recent months. This year the Mint has not been receiving good marks from its customer base.

There have been long waits for certain products and sellouts that prevented some buyers from getting what they ordered at all.

This is certainly a headache for the U.S. Mint.

Good news, though, seems to be that deliveries of the two-roll sets of the Lincoln Formative years cents have been occurring very rapidly and I am receiving e-mails and letters telling me of this fact.

Does this mean the tide is turning in the Mint’s favor? Are whatever problems and glitches there were now over? I hope so.

Complaints are a useful function for anybody in the business world because nobody is perfect. Complaints help find and fix weaknesses. But airing them in public as collectors do might raise an eyebrow or two among noncollectors who might stumble into our discussions.

Life cannot be all public relations, but it doesn’t hurt to keep an eye on the public relations impact of dissatisfied Mint customers so that we can continue to correct problems and thrive as a hobby.

Friday, June 05, 2009 2:05:11 PM (GMT Daylight Time, UTC+01:00)

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Thursday, June 04, 2009

Indictment a turning point?
Posted by Dave

News of the indictment of Bernard von NotHaus in the Western District of North Carolina startled me this morning.

The charge seems to essentially be counterfeiting.

Why is this a surprise?

Suppressing counterfeits has been a mission of government since the republic was founded in 1776 and by the Secret Service since its earliest days.

Since its founding in 1865, historically vigorous Secret Service enforcement has led to some mighty strange actions, including confiscating paintings that depict paper money. In my lifetime even putting currency on beach towels has been a no-no.

However, the dominant trend during the last 25 or 30 years has been a growing leniency. Perhaps this is the turning point.

I have met von NotHaus. He used to operate the Royal Hawaiian Mint and produced fascinating pieces in silver and gold of what could have been the coins of the 19th century Kingdom of Hawaii. They were sold to tourists and to collectors.

The work was beautiful.

He sold that business. He went on to marketing silver and gold pieces he called Liberty Dollars that could be coins of the United States, but aren’t, and began marketing them as some form of substitute currency.

I don’t think anyone would actually mistake his products as U.S. coinage – certainly not collectors – but the claim of alternative money apparently is a dangerous one.

What really puzzles me, if I have read this right, is that the action is based on the silver and gold pieces and not the paper certificates he also issued.

That strikes me as the strangest part of all.

Thursday, June 04, 2009 2:16:19 PM (GMT Daylight Time, UTC+01:00)

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Wednesday, June 03, 2009

Lincoln numbers tantalizing
Posted by Dave

I think I will pick up where I left off at yesterday’s second blog posting about quarter production and jump back into details of the U.S. Mint’s May production.

With many collector eyes searching for the two Lincoln cent designs that have been released so far this year, I have a good reason to mention how many of the coins they are looking for.

The first design had a total mintage, Denver and Philadelphia combined, of 634,800,000. So far, the numbers for the second design add up to 510,800,000 pieces.

Where the Birthplace design breaks down as 350,400,000 Denver coins and 284,400,000 Philly pieces, the second design at the moment reverses the relative positions. Denver comes in at 199,200,000 coins and Philadelphia at 311,600,000.

Are these final numbers? I don’t think so. The Mint can still strike more in June. Will it do so? That’s where you can place your bets if you are bold enough to do so.

The third design will likely be released in August, though the Mint says the Professional Lincoln cent will be released sometime during the summer. August is three months after the May release of the second design and May was three months after the release of the first design in February.

To have a supply of the third design, the Mint obviously will have to begin production beforehand. How much beforehand will determine how many of the second design will be produced.

Right now it would seem that the Mint is on track to strike at least as many of the second design as the first.

Wednesday, June 03, 2009 1:56:43 PM (GMT Daylight Time, UTC+01:00)

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Tuesday, June 02, 2009

Guam the scarce one now
Posted by Dave

After just a few week’s as the lowest mintage 2009 quarter dollar, the Philadelphia Puerto Rico design has been given the boot.

The new holder of the low-mintage title for the year is the Denver Guam quarter. The total mintage has fallen to just 42.6 million pieces, as compared to the 53.2 million for the Philadelphia Puerto Rico issue.

Even the Philadelphia Guam came in below the low-mintage Puerto Rico quarter. There are 45 million of these.

At the rate production is declining, we could be talking of quarter designs that number from 10 million or 20 million pieces by year end.

This potential outcome hinges on coin demand in the nation’s banking system. If there is an uptick, more quarters will be ordered by the Federal Reserve System and the U.S. Mint will strike them.

If demand continues to decline, mintages will continue to run at numbers that the collectors of the 1950s would be familiar with.

Yet to come are the American Samoa, U.S. Virgin Islands and the Northern Mariana Islands designs. How low can mintages go for these? We'll see.

Tuesday, June 02, 2009 7:18:35 PM (GMT Daylight Time, UTC+01:00)

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Take tip from Eleanor
Posted by Dave

One of the best and worst parts of being active in coin collecting, whether as a hobbyist or as a writer about the hobby is that there is always something going on.

The flip side of that is that no matter what you do, you are never really done. There will always be more to do.

To counter any sense of frustration that might arise from always having one more thing to do is the create your own mileposts along the way to show what you have accomplished.

These mileposts might even be used in these hard times as family budgets are stressed and noncollecting spouses look with a jaundiced eye on any expenditures that don’t directly contribute to the basics of food and shelter.

Rather than becoming a source of marital stress, coin collecting can become a source of inner family strength. Coins are assets. They have monetary value. Some coins are so liquid in the financial sense that they are like money in the bank. Any collector who owns silver or gold coins can smile about them in light of the declines in IRA and 401(k) values.

Some coins are not liquid. They are like art, but value can be realized over the long term.

Coin knowledge is a greater asset. You can always turn it into monetary value by dabbling on eBay or jumping into vest pocket dealing in a major way.

I happen to be reading Doris Kearns Goodwin’s book, “No Ordinary Time,” about Franklin and Eleanor Roosevelt and the American home front during the stressful times of World War II.

It is an interesting book, and right on Page 374 the author notes that in later life, one of the great regrets that Eleanor had was she did not take an interest in the President’s stamp collecting. She felt it was a bond that could have been shared, but she missed out.

In time’s of stress, collecting is a good relaxer. If you don’t share it with your spouse, in the present economic environment, now might be the time.

Tuesday, June 02, 2009 2:13:31 PM (GMT Daylight Time, UTC+01:00)

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Monday, June 01, 2009

Anxious for numbers
Posted by Dave

It’s Monday. It’s June 1. I’m looking for news.

Am I preoccupied with gold knocking on the door of $1,000 a troy ounce for the third time since March of 2008?

No.

What I find myself anxiously awaiting are the May production figures from the U.S. Mint.

How many cents will have been struck?

How many Guam quarters came off the presses? Will I even be able to figure out the where the Puerto Rico quarters left off and Guam began?

It is all kind of fun.

Then there are the 2009 nickels and the dimes. I just had my first telephone report of the find of a 2009 dime in circulation. I assume it is a “P” because it was found in Massachusetts by Richard Hand. He promised to mail it. Will it arrive in the morning mail?

And, of course, there are other things going on in numismatics.

The Long Beach show was held this past weekend and has concluded. For years it was the informal demarcation line between the active collector spring season and the beginning of the sleepy summertime pace.

What will happen after this year's spring show?

With a Baltimore show following it by two weeks, will that become the demarcation line instead? We will have to wait for events to take place to find out.

One bit of news that I wish I didn’t have in hand already saddens me this week. It is the departure on Thursday of Sara Wait of the art department. Her husband has taken a job in Peoria, Ill., and with the end of the school year the family will now follow. It was always a pleasure working with her to make Numismatic News and other products look good. She will be missed, and I wish her all the best.

Monday, June 01, 2009 2:05:56 PM (GMT Daylight Time, UTC+01:00)

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Friday, May 29, 2009

Still hooked after all these years
Posted by Dave

Silver passed $15 a troy ounce yesterday. As someone who has watched daily fluctuations and been fascinated by them since 1968 when $2 seemed like a high price, this milestone seems significant.

Sure, the price has been higher before, but it rarely has stayed there. Each time silver pokes its head above $15, it gets my redoubled attention.

This morning as I write this, I was thinking in old-fashioned terms born when we didn’t have nice and handy one-ounce bullion coins.

I often still think in terms of $1,000 face value bags of U.S. dimes, quarters or half dollars struck 1964 and before.

It is in these terms that I measure everything.

The old rule of thumb for these bags is there are 715 troy ounces of silver per bag. Anyone looking up the weight of coins might pipe up that the books say that the coins add up to over 723 ounces, what gives?

The difference is a factor for wear. Indeed if all the coins were uncirculated, there would indeed be 723 ounces of silver in the bag, but since uncirculated coins would more likely trade for a numismatic premium, average wear was taken into account in the development by coin dealers of this handy rule of thumb.

This means a bag currently has a bullion value of $11,046.75, or roughly 11 times face value at the current $15.45 silver price.

So, $1 in standard .900 fine U.S. silver coin is now worth a minimum of $11.

You might wonder why my starting point was 1968. Well, until 1967 the U.S. Treasury controlled the price of silver just as it did the price of gold. It was in that year that the price was freed up and market forces began taking the value beyond the $1.2929 official ounce price. I was aware of silver's price before 1968, but it was in that year that I developed the habit of looking up the price every day in the morning newspaper that I delivered.

In that year, it had gotten really interesting and a record of $2.56 was achieved. That seemed amazing to me and I was hooked.

I still am after all these years.

Friday, May 29, 2009 2:10:55 PM (GMT Daylight Time, UTC+01:00)

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Thursday, May 28, 2009

Stop in Hawaii on way to Guam
Posted by Dave

I had a phone call from retired Coin Market editor Bob Wilhite yesterday. Though he retired almost 10 years ago at the end of 1999, in some ways it seems like he just left.

I see him from time to time at the Crystal Cafe or elsewhere around Iola.

Now what do you think was on his mind?

He had tried to e-mail me a link to an article that he had read and it bounced. The article was about attempts in Hawaii to boost tourism, but there was a little numismatic kicker that he had noticed. He thought it was funny and figured I would, too.

A hotel, as part of its tourist-booster package, gives guests two Hawaii state quarters.

I laughed, too, but of course part of my good humor derived from the obvious enjoyment Bob was having relating the details to me.

While I rather doubt that the two quarters will be sufficient inducement to visit Hawaii if the beaches, sea breezes and laid-back ambiance won’t do it, perhaps just getting people to think about Hawaii for any reason helps.

Then again, perhaps we should organize a twofer. Stop in Hawaii overnight to collect the quarters on our way to Guam for a June 4 ceremony at Skinner Plaza in Hagåtña, where Mint Director Ed Moy will introduce the new territorial quarter along with the governor and first lady.

Are you laughing yet?

Well, remember, with the banking system so backed up here in the continental United States, you might just have to go to Guam to get the new coins before Thanksgiving.

Thursday, May 28, 2009 2:03:05 PM (GMT Daylight Time, UTC+01:00)

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Wednesday, May 27, 2009

An impression and the latest cent sales
Posted by Dave

The second Lincoln cent design of 2009 seems to be making it into the hands of the public much faster than the first design did.

That is my impression. I do not have a national survey to report on this.

What I do have are anecdotal reports of receipt of the Formative Years design by collectors in Dallas, Texas, and Puerto Rico. The latter location was also fortunate in the first release.

However, it has been less than two weeks since the formal introduction of the Formative Years design in Lincoln City, Ind. It took much longer for this type of report to reach me after the first release in February.

What I also detect is a greater anxiety level among collectors. They are much more attuned to the second cent release than they were to the first. This is perhaps due to the all the excitement they witnesses the first time and a desire not to miss it the second time.

For some, this anxiety is almost becoming bitter. It is as if they were invited last to a party and they knew it. Now all they can do in the revelry is complain that they were the last to arrive.

I think we should just enjoy it. When I was a young collector in the 1960s I marveled at how fortunate the collectors of the 1907-1916 period were with all the beautiful new designs.

What I learned along the way was that many collectors of the envied time did not appreciate what was going on as it was occurring, with the major exception of the Lincoln cent because of the prominent V.D.B. initials.

When collectors look back on the present time in 2060, are they going to see a hobby enjoying an exciting time to be collectors, or will the overwhelming evidence be that we couldn’t take it?

Collectors of the future, of course, will have the advantage of final sales and mintage numbers while we are waiting week to week. The current Lincoln two-roll set sales figure is 222,826, up almost 23,000 since last week.

Wednesday, May 27, 2009 2:04:01 PM (GMT Daylight Time, UTC+01:00)

Comments [1]

Tuesday, May 26, 2009

Not doubled but DC quarter still a find
Posted by Dave

I spent part of my Memorial Day weekend at a family backyard barbecue at my nephew’s house on Sunday.

In between games of pitcher’s hand, tossing a football, ladder ball and the general chitchat, my 12-year-old grandnephew said that he had obtained a District of Columbia quarter in circulation. It is hard to find here as elsewhere. It was the first he had seen.
He wondered if I wanted to see it.

Sure, I wanted to see it.

The coin was a 2009-D. When new coins finally make it to my neck of the woods, they usually are from Denver.

We were out in the sunshine and I could not see Duke Ellington’s name on the piano in the bright light, so I asked if there was any evidence of doubling.

My grandnephew looked at it and quickly said there wasn’t. So, other readers will have to continue to scour their change for the design and see if a second example of the strongly doubled “E” in Ellington can be found.

I hope so.

Last week’s reader poll registered the opinion that the error is overrated by a 76 percent majority, but that number could easily swing the other way if more and more examples of it can be found in circulation. There is nothing like a few thousand collectors with newly found coins to help persuade the rest of us that the find is significant.

This was the only numismatic conversation I had during my entire weekend. I guess that means I relaxed.

Tuesday, May 26, 2009 2:01:10 PM (GMT Daylight Time, UTC+01:00)

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